First of all, I’m sorry for your experience and lost gear.
This behavior has been a part of the game for quite a while. While your character will not be under the effects of thirst or hunger while signed out, you can take damage from other players (depending on game mode), NPCs, and environmental factors. Environmental factors might not include the sandstorm, but do include temperature changes and noxious gas, fire, explosions.
I do believe that having the area you are in actively rendered by another player is a requirement, but that’s mostly an educated presumption.
If you have a base that is in the cold, try placing warming lighting, torches, etc around your sign out location. Solutions like that which don’t require fuel solved this problem for me. Also, certain armor is better than others for insulation effects. Actually the basic cloth armor isn’t bad.
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